Dwight Lyman Moody

Dwight
Lyman Moody, the lay Evangelist, was born in the town of Northfield, Mass.,
[United States], on the 5th of February, 1837. He came of the old Puritan
stock, his father's and mother's families being numbered among the earliest
settlers of that state. His father, Edwin, owned a comfortable farm-house
just without the town, and a few acres of stony land, the whole encumbered
by a mortgage. When the building trade was brisk, he worked as a stone mason,
and his leisure hours he spent in cultivating his little farm. But his spirit
was crushed by reverses in business, and he died suddenly after an illness
of few hours. Dwight was then only four year old, but the shock of that death
made an impression on him which he declares he has never forgotton. This
blow was followed by the birth of a twin boy and girl a few weeks later.
Thus Mrs. Moody was burdened with the care of seven sons, and two daughters,
of whom the eldest boy was only aged fifteen. Yet this widowed mother refused
to part with any of her little brood. She bravely set about caring for them
all, and contrived to have the little hands earn something for their support,
by tilling the garden and doing odd jobs for the neighbors. She taught them
every day a little Bible lesson, and always accompanied them to the Unitarian
church and Sunday-school.

Another sorrow came on the bereaved family, through the oldest boy becoming
a runaway. We give Moody's description of this incident, as he told it in
England, and because of the insight it gives into his home life.

"I can give you a little experience of my own family. Before
I was four years old the first thing I remember was the death of my father.
He had been unfortunate in business, and failed. Soon after his death the
creditors came in and took everything. My mother was left with a large family
of children. One calamity after another swept over the entire household.
Twins were added to the family, and my mother was taken sick. The eldest
boy was fifteen years of age, and to him my mother looked as a stay in her
calamity, but all at once that boy became a wanderer. He had been reading
some of the trashy novels, and the belief had seized him that he had only
to go away to make a fortune. Away he went. I can remember how eagerly she
used to look for tidings of that boy; how she used to send us to the post
office to see if there was a letter from him, and recollect how we used to
come back with the sad news, "No letter." I remember how in the
evenings we used to sit beside her in that New England home, and we would
talk about our father; but the moment the name of that boy was mentioned
she would hush us into silence. Some nights when the wind was very high,
and the house, which was upon a hill, would tremble at every gust, the voice
of my mother was raised in prayer for that wanderer who had treated her so
unkindly. I used to think she loved him more than all of us put together,
and I believe she did. On a Thanksgiving day—you know that is a family
day in New England—she used to set a chair for him, thinking he would
return home. Her family grew up and her boys left home. When I got so that
I could write, I sent letters all over the country, but could find no trace
of him. One day, in Boston, the news reached me that he had returned. While
in that city, I remember how I used to look for him in every store—he
had a mark on his face—but I never got any trace. One day while my
mother was sitting at the door, a stranger was seen coming toward the house,
and when he came to the door he stopped. My mother didn't know her boy. He
stood there with folded arms and great beard flowing down his breast, his
tears trickling down his face. When my mother saw those tears she cried, "Oh,
it's my lost son," and entreated him to come in. But he stood still.
"No, mother," he said, "I will not come in until I hear first
that you have forgiven me." Do you believe she was not willing to forgive
him? Do you think she was likely to keep him long standing there. She rushed
to the threshold, threw her arms around him, and breathed forgiveness."

In his boyhood, Dwight was healthy, boisterous, self-willed, and a born leader
among his playmates. His mother has said that he used to think himself a
man when he was only a boy. He was by no means a promising scholar, for his
head was more filled with thoughts of play and mischief than of study. He
has related that his first master was quick-tempered and used to bring down
his rattan often on his back. But the next teacher was a gentle lady, who
was eager to rule the school with love. He chanced to be the first one who
violated her discipline. The sturdy boy thought himself able to resist any
further rattanning, and doubtless he was. When she told him privately, however,
how she loved him and her school, and said, "I want to ask you one favor—that
is, if you love me, try and be a good boy."

This spirited, untamed lad possessed a very receptive nature, and it was silently
alive to the incidents of every-day life. His sermons abound with instances
of how his early character was moulded by casual occurrences that would have
been unfelt by most folks. He always remembered the efficacy of a prayer
that dated back to his sixth year. An old fence up on a hillside had fallen
upon him, and his efforts to get from under the heavy rails all failed. Then,
as he said, "I happened to think that maybe God would help me, and so
I asked him; and after that I could lift the rails." The tolling of
the church bell at each death in the village came to his mind very solemnly.
The gift of a penny by an old man in a neighboring town was always fragrant
in his memory. But a singular incident which occurred in his youth, some
little while before he left his home, seems to have had so profound an influence
in preparing his heart for acknowledging the Savior as its rightful ruler
that it cannot well be passed over unnoticed. He has told it in these words:

"When I was a young boy—before I was a Christian—I
was in a field one day with a man who was hoeing. He was weeping, and he
told me a strange story, which I have never forgotten. When he left home
his mother gave him this text: 'Seek first the kingdom of God.' But he paid
no heed to it. He said when he got settled in life, and his ambition to get
money was gratified, it would be time enough then to seek the kingdom of
God. He went from one village to another and got nothing to do. When Sunday
came he went into a village church, and what was his great surprise to hear
the minister give out the text, 'Seek first the kingdom of God.' He said
the text went down to the bottom of his heart. He thought it was but his
mother's prayer following him, and that some one must have written to that
minister about him. He felt very uncomfortable, and when the meeting was
over he could not get that sermon out of his mind. He went away from that
town, and at the end of a week went into another church and he heard the
minister give out the same text, 'Seek first the kingdom of God.' He felt
sure this time that it was the prayers of his mother, but he said calmly
and deliberately, 'No, I will first get wealthy.' He said he went on and
did not go into a church for a few months, but the first place of worship
he went into he heard a third minister preaching a sermon from the same text.
He tried to drown—to stifle his feelings; tried to get the sermon out
of his mind, and resolved that he would keep away from church altogether,
and for a few years he did keep out of God's house. 'My mother died,' he
said, 'and the text kept coming up in my mind, and I said I will try and
become a Christian.' The tears rolled down his cheeks, as he said, 'I could
not; no sermon ever touched me; my heart is as hard as that stone,' pointing
to one in the field. I couldn't understand what it was all about—it
was fresh to me then. I went to Boston and got converted, and the first thought
that came to me was about this man. When I got back I asked my mother, 'Is
Mr. L— living in such a place? 'Didn't I write to you about him?' she
asked. 'They have taken him to an insane asylum, and to every one who goes
there he points with his finger up there and tells him to seek first the
kingdom of God.' There was that man with his eyes dull with the loss of reason,
but the text had sunk into his soul—it had burned down deep. Oh, may
the Spirit of God burn the text into your hearts to-night. When I got home
again my mother told me he was in his house, and I went to see him. I found
him in a rocking chair, with that vacant, idiotic look upon him. As soon
as he saw me, he pointed at me and said: 'Young man, seek first the kingdom
of God.' Reason was gone, but the text was there. Last month, when I was
laying my brother down in his grave, I could not help thinking of that poor
man who was lying so near him, and wishing that the prayer of his mother
had been heard, and that he had found the kingdom of God."

Young Moody, at the age of seventeen, left Northfield, with his mother's permission,
to seek employment in Boston, where his uncle was in business as a shoe merchant.
Mr. Holton engaged his country nephew with some reluctance, and on two conditions.
The lad agreed to be governed by his advice, and to attend regularly the
Sunday school and services of the Mount Vernon Congregational church. Its
pastor was the eloquent and learned Dr. E. N. Kirk, who, in earlier years,
had accomplished much good as an evangelist. The lad was not much impressed
by the preaching, which he was not qualified to comprehend; but the personal
efforts of his teacher, Mr. Edward Kimball, were blessed to his conversion.
Many years after, he told the story of how he was saved.

"When I was in Boston, I used to attend a Sunday-school class,
and one day I recollect a Sabbath-school teacher came round behind the counter
of the shop I was to work in, and put his hand on my shoulder, and talked
to me about Christ and my soul. I had not felt that I had a soul till then.
I said. 'This is a very strange thing. Here is a man who never saw me until
within a few days, and he is weeping over my sins, and I never shed a tear
about them.' But I understand it now, and know what it is to have a passion
for men's souls and weep over their sins. I don't remember what he said,
but I can feel the power of that young man's hand on my shoulder to-night.
Young Christian men, go and lay your hand on your comrade's shoulder, and
point him to Jesus to-night. Well, he got me up to the school, and it was
not long before I was brought into the kingdom of God."

Years afterward, when Mr. Moody was preaching in Boston, he was permitted
to lead to the Savior a son of that teacher, who found peace in believing
just at his own age of seventeen. Thus the seed sown on the waters bore in
due time the sweetest fruitage for the sower.

The young convert was unpromising enough at first, in outward appearance.
He knew very little of the Scriptures, and he was not grounded in evangelical
truth. Besides, his bashful shyness in the presence of cultured, refined
Christians, his poor command of words to express his thoughts, and his broken,
awkward sentences, made him, in the language of his teacher, very 'unlikely
ever to become a Christian of clear and decided views of gospel truth, still
less to fill any extended sphere of public usefulness.' Therefore it was
that he was not accepted into membership until May, 1856, a year after his
first application. He remained but a few months longer in Boston. He longed
for a wider field of usefulness, where his energy in business and religious
work would be less trammeled. So, in September, 1856, he betook himself to
Chicago with testimonials which secured him a business engagement as salesman
in the shoe trade. He also entered the Plymouth Congregational Church, and
showed his earnest spirit by renting four pews, which he kept filled with
young men and boys. He desired to work in the service of prayer; but the
brethren were not patient enough to suffer his crude experience, and suggestions
were not infrequent that he could best serve the Lord by silence.

Mr. Moody's first start in the work of reaching souls was obtained through
a little mission school. He offered himself as teacher, and was told he might
attend if he would bring his own scholars. So that week he collected together
some eighteen ragged boys, and marched in at their head on the next Sunday.
He liked such work so well that he set about further visitations in the by-streets,
and soon had the school filled. He also busied himself in distributing tracts,
and in looking after the good of the seamen at the wharves. His ardent spirit
soon impelled him to set up a mission for himself, in a neglected and degraded
section of North Chicago. He paid for the hire of an empty tavern, and gathered
together the unclean and rude children of the neighborhood for Sunday-school
services while the intemperate and ignorant adults were reached in the evening
meetings. The poor little ones were won over to attention by gifts of maple
sugar, and a liberal lot of hymns and stories. Just at this time, Mr. Reynolds,
of Peoria, visited this humble mission. His description of the service is
invaluable, as illustrating the progressive growth of the lay evangelist
in strength and usefulness.

"The first meeting I ever saw him at," he said several
years since, "was in a little old shanty that had been abandoned by
a saloon keeper. Mr. Moody had got the place to hold the meetings in at night.
I went there a little late, and the first thing I saw was a man standing
up, with a few tallow candles around him, holding a negro boy, and trying
to read to him the story of the Prodigal Son; and a great many of the words
he could not make out, and had to skip. I thought, if the Lord can ever use
such an instrument as that for his honor and glory, it will astonish me.
After that meeting was over. Mr. Moody said to me: 'Reynolds; I have got
only one talent. I have no education, but I love the Lord Jesus Christ, and
I want to do something for him. I want you to pray for me.' I have never
ceased from that day to this, morning and night, to pray for that devoted
Christian soldier. I have watched him since then, have had counsel with him,
and know him thoroughly; and, for consistent walk and conversation, I have
never met a man to equal him. It astounds me when I look back and see what
Mr. Moody was thirteen years ago, and then what he is under God today—shaking
Scotland to its very centre, and reaching now over to Ireland. The last time
I heard from him, his injunction was, 'Pray for me every day; pray now that
the Lord will keep me humble.'"

Henceforth, missionary efforts were the uppermost concern in his daily life.
The growth of his school led to the occupation of the North Market Hall,
and John V. Farwell, a liberal merchant who supplied benches for the scholars,
had the grace to become its superintendent. Under Moody's vigorous canvassing,
the average attendance was kept up to 650, and sixty teachers were obtained.
His engagements as a traveling salesman were not suffered to interfere with
these Sunday duties, and he was rarely compelled to be absent. As the hall
was used till a late hour on Saturday night for dancing, it was his custom
for six years to clean out the dirt and put the room in decent condition
for the services. And he took care to let his light shine wherever he went.
He feared neither drunkards nor rumsellers, deists nor infidels, for he felt
himself a match for any adversary when armed with the sword of the Spirit
and strengthened by prayer. When the children of Roman Catholic parents stoned
his windows he at once sought redress of their bishop, and so won his confidence
by a devout simplicity of spirit that immunity was secured for the future.
His courageous avowal of his faith was startling to timid believers. When
he was solicitous about the salvation of an acquaintance or a stranger, he
hesitated not to kneel and offer prayer for his conversion then and there,
no matter whether they were out in the streets or traveling in a railroad
car. His faith and spirit of consecration waxed stronger by the study of
God's Word and the constant fruitage of his life in good works.

In 1860, after a time of soul-searching in prayer, he determined to give all
his time to God as an Evangelist. When his employer inquired how he expected
to support himself, he replied: "God will provide for me if he wishes
me to keep on, and I shall keep on till I am obliged to stop." His impulse
in this personal work for souls was derived from the zeal of one of his teachers,
who was dying of consumption, and who was permitted, before his death, to
lead every one of his large class to the Savior. He reduced his expenses
to a minimum by doing without a home, so that he slept on a bench in the
room of the Young Men's Christian Association, and spent but little for food.
After a time, contributions came to him from friends, and he was appointed
a city missionary, so that his means for assisting the destitute were much
enlarged. He commenced then to fulfill a vow by speaking to one unconverted
man every day. Sometimes his tender approaches were rejected with scorn and
cursing, but again and again persons who had vilified him were drawn by the
power of a conscience under conviction to seek the intercession of his prayers,
that they might be led to the Savior.

In the spirit of reliance on the leading of the Lord, the evangelist was married
on the 28th of August, 1862, to Miss Emma C. Revell. This Christian lady
was an helpful assistant in his meetings, and her sympathy made their little
fireside a refuge of rest to him amid his toils. For years their home was
a small and plain cottage. But its hospitality became proverbial, for gospel
workers and reclaimed prodigals were entertained without stint. The gift
of a daughter and a son made the father more susceptible to the thoughts
and impulses of child-life. He took care always to remain in close communion
with their budding minds, and his sermons often have graphic illustrations
of the methods he took to make them familiar with the fundamental truths
of the faith. Meanwhile his daily living was wholly committed to the providence
of God. His mind was absorbed in watching over the souls of the throngs about
him, and he obeyed the scriptural injunction to take no anxious thought for
the morrow. He lived the placid life befitting a child of God, having the
trustful faith that his father would supply his needs while he was busy as
a worker in his vineyard. One morning he said to his wife: "I have no
money, and the house is without supplies. It looks as if the Lord had had
enough of me in this mission work, and is going to send me back again to
sell boots and shoes." But a day or two later brought to him two checks,
one of fifty dollars for himself and the other for his school. He accepted
this gift as a token from the Lord that he was held in favor. This instance
was but one of many of a similar character. His unselfish labors raised up
for him many friends, and these gave him, on New Year's day, 1868, the lease
of a pleasant and furnished house.

This whole season was one abounding in labors. Besides his army services,
Mr. Moody was keenly alive to the needs of his mission at the North Market
Hall. His school numbered a thousand scholars. The congregation he had gathered
together now contained three hundred adults converted under his preaching.
Thus had grown up, wholly without human design, a staunch and inseparable
congregation under a lay pastor. This was organized as an independent fold,
on the basis of the evangelical faith. In 1863 a church building was erected
on Illinois street at a cost of $20,000. Never had a people a more faithful
and energetic pastor to watch over their welfare. Nor was he in the least
forgetful of the Young Men's Christian Association, of Chicago. By his efforts
its noon services for prayer were attended steadily by a thousand people.
When its members were intent on obtaining a permanent hall, they elected
him president in 1865. Their expectations were fulfilled by the speedy erection
of "Farwell Hall," and its dedication on the 29th of September,
1867. That building was destroyed by fire within a few months, but his exhaustless
energy soon reared a second edifice on the same site. On Sunday evenings
he used to preach in its hall after spending the morning in his own pulpit,
and the afternoon in superintending ten hundred school children.

When Farwell Hall was dedicated, as "the first hall ever erected for
Christian young men," Mr. Moody confessed his faith that, by the Lord's
blessing, a religious influence was to go out from them that "should
extend through every county in the State, through every State in the Union,
and finally, crossing the water should help to bring the whole world to God." And
this blessing did speedily begin. Through the earnest efforts of Mr. Moody,
the Christians of Springfield were awakened to the need of prayer for the
approaching meeting of the State Convention of Sunday-school teachers. As
the results, all its sessions exhibited a hallowed influence. Many conversions
occurred, and the delegates bore through the length and breadth of the State
tokens of the fervid baptism of the Spirit.

Mr. Moody has been for years peculiarly a Bible Christian. Again and again
friends have suggested to him certain courses of study, or the reading of
particular books. But the pressure of his active duties as an evangelist
has always intervened and prevented him from making any effort for the attainment
of a theological education. Hence, he has been providentially driven to depend
upon his personal study of the Bible itself, as its own best interpreter.
The solemn injunction of Holy Writ to "Preach the Word," and the
Word only, was impressed upon his mind by Harry Morehouse, "the boy
preacher" of Manchester, who told him: "You need only one book
for the study of the Bible. Since I have been an evangelist I have been the
man of one book. If a text of scripture troubles me, I ask another text to
explain it; and if this will not answer I carry it straight to the Lord." He
met this lad, then aged seventeen, in his first visit to England and Ireland
in 1867. A few months later, Morehouse visited Chicago, and delighted Mr.
Moody by delivering seven Bible readings upon the love of God. He brought
a multitude of passages to illustrate the depth of spiritual meaning in the
text of John 3:16, which Luther has well termed "the little Gospel." This
intercourse came to him as a new revelation of the wonders of God's Word
and love. From that time his two accepted guide books were Cruden's Concordance
and the little Bible Text Books. These aids enabled him to trace any word
or doctrine through the Holy Scriptures. In Mr. Moody's second visit to England,
in the spring of 1872, he learned from the devout Plymouth Brethren to appreciate
and appropriate the promises which abound in the Bible of the second coming
of Christ. "I have felt like working three times as hard," he has
stated, "since I came to understand that my Lord was coming back again.
I look on this world as a wrecked vessel. God has given me a life-boat, and
said to me, 'Moody, save all you can.'" He was also impressed by the
prediction of Henry Varley, the Bible reader: "It remains for the world
to see what the Lord can do with a man wholly consecrated to Christ." Again,
at another time, he heard one Christian ask another of himself: "Is
this young man all O. O.?" meaning, "is he out and out for
Christ?" He has confessed that this question burned down into his soul,
and taught him that it meant a good deal to be O. O. for Christ.

The terrible fire of October, 1871, which swept Chicago into a whirlwind of
flame, laid in ruins all the buildings that were associated with his labors.
It also separated from him his yoke-fellow, Mr. Ira D. Sankey, who had joined
him as a gospel singer only four months before. But the evangelist was not
cast down. Contributions came to his aid from his friends in the East, in
answer to his appeals. Within three months he had a large frame Tabernacle
erected, measuring seventy-five by one hundred and nine feet. All his services
were resumed, and the building also served as a storehouse of supplies for
the impoverished district. His plans were laid out for the completion of
a permanent church edifice, and an appeal for aid was made to the Sunday-school
children of the land. While this was in progress, the two yoke-fellows, after
a patient waiting on the Lord for guidance, accepted an invitation to visit
the British Isles as evangelists. Mr. Moody, after four months of self-searching
inquiry, had made an entire consecration of his life to the the Lord, and
was fired with a baptism of the Spirit which, as he avowed later, made him
eager "To go round the world and tell the perishing millions of a Savior's
love."